The invention relates to an assembly with two bevel gear angle drives, for driving an agricultural implement which is attached to a tractor via a power take-off shaft. The two bevel gear angle drives are pivotable relative to one another, via a pivot bearing arranged around a connecting shaft, around the rotational axis of the connecting shaft common to both bevel gear angle drives. The pivot bearing includes two bearing sleeves each one being connected to one of the two housings and arranged coaxially around one another. The connecting shaft axially extends through the bore of the inner one of the two bearing sleeves. The two bevel gear angle drives each include a housing which supports the connecting shaft. The connecting shaft, on its portion extending into a housing, non-rotatably supports a bevel gear which engages a further bevel gear connected to a connecting journal which extends out of the associated housing at a right angle relative to the connecting shaft.
An assembly is described in EP 0 124 462 A1, published Nov. 11, 1984, where two bevel gear angle drives are provided with flanged-on bearing sleeves which are arranged outside the drives and which may be pivoted relative to one another by a friction bearing. On the one hand, the connecting shaft is supported indirectly in the bearing sleeves by bevel gears connected to the shaft and on the other hand, it is supported directly in the housings of the two bevel gear angle drives. As such assemblies are used for articulatingly connecting a tractor to an implement and as, in consequence, towing forces are transmitted, quite considerable lever arms occur which are due to the distance between the two bevel gear angle drives which results from the in-between arrangement of the bearing means. A further disadvantage exists in that the towing forces may cause jamming because the bearing means are overloaded; there is one bearing in the bearing sleeves and one in the housings.
In order to improve the bearing conditions, EP 0 434 915 A2, published Jul. 3, 1991, describes a solution. Here, the connecting shaft is supported in the bearing sleeves only. Furthermore, the bearing sleeves are held relative to one another by means of tapered roller bearings.